Gordon Van Gelder has put together theme anthologies culled from the pages of The Magazine of Fantasy & Science Fiction. For
more information, click on the book cover or title link.
Paper copies, signed by the Editor, are available by either choosing the PayPal buttons (below) or by using your credit card on our secure server.

Many science fiction writers view the novella as the optimal length-short enough to be read in one sitting, but long enough to build a world.

And what better world can we build and examine, than the landscape of our lonely souls?

Gordon Van Gelder has brought together a set of four novellas that dig deeper into the recesses of our beings.

In "Goliath of Gath," Jan Lars Jensen offers us a look at figure of legend not usually considered: Goliath. One of the last of his people, the giants, in a changing social and political landscape. A pacifist manipulated into death with the promise of peace. A man whose story is rarely examined in favor of David, the plucky hero of the Bible.

Then Eric Carl Wolf brings us to a grassy, cowboy-country, beef-herding planet as barren as the Old West in "Demands of Ghosts," where we meet a former assassin seeking anonymity and redemption.

In "One Day at the Zoo" by Rand B. Lee a young girl with special powers is "saved" from being experimented on by the closest person to her, her mother, who seeks instead to destroy her.

In a strange, violent, debauched future, an assassin confronts a new technology that enables immortality, destroying the value of death, and he begins a quest for oblivion, so goes "Final Kill" by Chris DeVito.

In the minds of readers and writers of science fiction and fantasy since H. G. Wells's War of the Worlds, Mars has been the hottest of topics. The fourth planet from the sun is the confirmed obsession of millions of Earthlings, and it is not a fixation that will go away. Perhaps noting the tens of millions of hits on the NASA websites during the recent exploration of Mars, President Bush has declared a manned visit to the red planet the next great goal of the space program.

"This collection is as timely as it is enthralling. From Bradbury's post-WWII classic to Alex Irvine's 2003 release "Pictures from an Expedition," it's fascinating to read how authors' conceptions of Mars have changed so dramatically over time. As with other anthologies Van Gelder has put together in recent years (One Lamp, In Lands That Never Were, et al.), this collection is absolutely extraordinary."
—Paul Goat Allen, bn.com

"...we have here some of the best short fiction the genre has to offer."
—Don D'Ammassa, Chronicle #257, March 2005

"Let me summarize with the two highest bits of praise I can give to any writing: Every one of these stories makes me want to read more by these authors. All of these stories make me want to write more myself."
—Steven Saus, Amazon.com reader review

"This is just a dozen stories, from one magazine. That said, these are fine stories, and it is interesting to see how differently Mars has been represented over the years."
—Greg Beatty, Internet Review of SF

Long before Arnold attempted a pale copy, Conan the Barbarian held sway over the land, and all was swell. Neither man nor woman, beast nor spirit could rival him. Then, for many a day, he disappeared ... but lo, now he's back! Conan is featured, together with some of fantasy's favorite characters, in this compendium of swordplay and wizardry, fleet-footed thieves and flat-footed palace guards, witches and man-eating leopards, giants and giant slugs.

"A fast-paced collection, scouring years of Fantasy & Science Fiction Magazine to present the best sword and sorcery tales around. A number of Conan the Barbarian style "classic" sword and sorcery adventures appear, along with more modern tales from worlds such as Le Guin's Earthsea and R. Garcia y Robertson's Markovy. . . . This is a strong, well thought-out collection with the best of action and sorcery."
—Valerie Frankel, Rambles.net

The alternate history story is probably the purest form of "what if" speculation. From earthshaking encounters, such as Gandhi's pacifists facing down the Nazis, to absurd ones, such as Philip K. Dick hobnobbing with Richard M. Nixon, this book explores what-might-have-been, pasts that never were. If Mark Twain had encountered Quantrill's Raiders… if Rome never fell… if the past could be re-made, reshaped to our desires.

"It's a nice selection, not just because the quality of the individual stories is so good, but
because the periods of history, the plots, and even the gimmicks differ a great deal from one to the next."
—Don D'Ammassa, Chronicle

"This is also quite an interesting selection and short of reading MoF&SF, I doubt if you'll see
such a collection as this put together in one volume. . . . This is the kind of book that needs to be
read to understand the legacy you're living on if you write alternative history stories."
—GF Willmetts, SF Crowsnest

"There are several memorable stories in One Lamp. To name a few: Dana Wilde's "The Green Moon" is a
hauntingly poignant meditation, tracking the effects of multiple historical tamperings on memory;
Paul Di Filippo's "And I Think to Myself, What a Wonderful World" imagines a wildly different 1960s
cultural explosion; and the anthology's best selection, Jan Lars Jensen's epic and multiculturally
savvy "The Secret History of the Ornithopter", describes a twentieth century in which a different kind
of air-travel technology is developed."
—Claude Lalumiere, The Montreal Gazette

United States and U.S. possessions

Canada and elsewhere

Paper copies are available, signed by the Editor, for $17.95 postpaid ($41.95 to Canada and elsewhere).
You may fax a Mastercard or Visa order to 201-876-2551 (please give your credit card # and expiry date), or send your
order with payment to: Fantasy & Science Fiction, P.O. Box 3447, Hoboken, NJ 07030.